Posted
by
msmash
on Thursday June 01, 2017 @03:20PM
from the done-deal dept.

It's official. President Donald Trump announced today that the United States will withdraw from the Paris climate agreement, following through on a pledge he made during the presidential campaign. Trump said the Paris agreement "front loads costs on American people. In order to fulfill my solemn duty to protect America and its citizens, the United States will withdraw from the Paris climate accord but begin negotiations to reenter either the Paris accord or an entirely new transaction on terms that are fair to the United States," the president said. "We are getting out. But we will start to negotiate, and we will see if we can make a deal that's fair. And if we can, that's great." Trump said that the United States will immediately "cease all implementation of the non-binding Paris accord" and what he said were "draconian financial" and other burdens imposed on the country by the accord.

It is impossible to know the foreign relations implications of this long term, except to know it can't be good. All but two nations signed this agreement, with one rejecting it because it didn't go far enough (Nicaragua) and one not even being invited to the table because of its government's legitimacy problems (Syria). The United States is now the only country on the planet who is not part of this agreement because it doesn't find the problem important enough.

It now becomes harder to get countries to work with us on just about anything if we aren't even willing to be part of a goodwill gesture that had no real consequences to us if we stayed in it. It shows the world grown ups are not in control of the executive branch.

s impossible to know the foreign relations implications of this long term, except to know it can't be good.

It's great! Fuck globalism. This is just another reclamation of American sovereignty.

As others have said, we're going to reduce CO2 emissions anyway, through consumer choice and technology. This isn't about CO2, it's about global government vs national government.

And that's swiftly replacing the old "left vs right" as the axis of political division. It's all about "globalist vs populist" now, with a still-rising tide of anti-globalist sentiment. Anti-globablist moves like Brexit and Trump are just the

Fuck globalism. This is just another reclamation of American sovereignty.

You can spout off about globalist vs nationalist policies all you want, but even the hermit nation of North Korea understood this issue was important enough to show solidarity with the rest of the world on. When Kim Jong-un can work with other nations better than your President, that is a problem.

Fuck globalism. This is just another reclamation of American sovereignty.

You can spout off about globalist vs nationalist policies all you want, but even the hermit nation of North Korea understood this issue was important enough to show solidarity with the rest of the world on. When Kim Jong-un can work with other nations better than your President, that is a problem.

Has nothing to do with that. Kim Jong-un signed it because North Korea would *receive* money, not pay it out. He'd be a fool to turn down free money.

Honestly, whether a nation signs or not has very little to do with recognition of the issue as being important and more to do with where money is going. IIRC, if the US had joined it then like with the UN the US would have been paying out more money than any other country - which makes zero sense for the benefit. UN at least had some controls that gave the US significant power in its operations (Security Council, etc). The Paris Accord does not do that - money comes from rich countries and goes to the corrupt, poor countries and dictators like Kim Jong-un - many of whom will probably turn around and use it for weapons instead of its real purpose, or at least siphon off a lot of it via bribes and do that even if they show a facade of implementing what the money was for - it'll cost a lot more as a result too.

This just in, belligerent nations also understand the value of global virtue-signalling.

China and India are the ONLY ones that matter in terms of global emissions. They still have 2 billion people between them that are dirt-poor and have yet to take part in their national economy in any meaningful way. Right now, with only 1/4 of their populations economically active, they account for over 37% of TOTAL GLOBAL EMISSIONS.

The US, with 350m people and 99% economic engagement accounts for 16% and decreasing. China and India will continue growing, and their overall percentage will increase dramatically in just 5 years.

Per-capita use isn't an argument either, sure the US has higher per-capita use, but if you look at the actual number of economically engaged people in India and China, their per-capita use is actually higher than the US, it's just averaged out across the other 2 billion people that aren't responsible for anything more than cookfire smoke - no cars, no consumer goods, no roads, no airplane travel, because they can't afford any of those luxuries.

The US was committed to 25%+ reduction in just 7 years. China and India's pledges were next to nothing - no percentages of reductions, just vague promises to spend more on renewables and the (non-binding) promise to do 'something' by 2030. That's a pretty one-sided agreement, and the 25%+ reduction in the US would do absolutely nothing in the long-term for the world, but would hurt the US economy.

The United States is now the only country on the planet who is not part of this agreement because it doesn't find the problem important enough.

Some people keep saying that this agreement doesn't cost anything because it doesn't require anything, but then complain because we are no longer a signatory to an agreement that doesn't require anything and can thus not accomplish anything.

And you are quick to assign motives that weren't actually expressed. "Didn't find the problem important enough" is your opinion. It could also be that "this agreement does nothing to accomplish the alleged goal but will cost money complying with, even if it is just 'goo

If your argument is Trump is the only leader wise enough to see that the agreement's problems are worse than its benefits, then there is no reason to discourse with you. If this was a case of only 60% of world leaders being part of the agreement then you would have at least some argument. But there is no sanity in a man who thinks Trump's opinions about this agreement are far more insightful than every other executive leader in the world.

The Paris accords are 100% voluntary with no enforcement procedure. Honestly, what's their point? They do call for hundreds of millions of dollars in transfers to developing countries but with no penalties if those payments aren't made. It is simple PR fodder for politicians.

Trumps cancelation of US involvement will have less than zero impact on climate change as the US is already one of the world leaders in CO2 reduction just through simple normal advancements in business practices and technology.

If you truly need a piece of paper to make you feel safe then feel free to go print up a copy of the accords and place it under your pillow at night; it will have about the same affect as all those other politicians signing it.

The Paris accords are 100% voluntary with no enforcement procedure. Honestly, what's their point?

China, the world's biggest emitter, has exceeded the goals it agreed to. India has too. Much of Europe has or is at least trying hard to.

Renewables are where the jobs and money are. The agreement really helps by giving governments political capital to reduce subsidies for other forms of energy and redirect them. It also helped develop the huge market for renewable technologies, which the US is now turning away from.

that's what we're worried about. Yes, it has no force of law or actual requirements. It's a feel good treaty all around. That's what makes pulling out so bad. There's only one reason to pull out, and it's to say: Fuck You World. By pulling out we send a message that we're not willing to even consider working with the rest of the world.

CNN has an article describing how this could lead to a trade war. TLDR: Frustrated nations slap carbon taxes on imported goods because they're building with clean energy while we shamelessly pollute (which is much cheaper) and then Trump responds with his own tarriffs. Then it escalates from there and badda bing badda boom, recession/depression.

IMO, any environmental agreements are incompatible with free trade, unless both countries have the same laws. Otherwise you just hurt your own businesses.

Let's say you open a factory in your country - the laws say that you cannot dump toxic waste into a nearby river, so you have to pay for proper disposal, the cost of that is passed to the consumer by way of increased price. That's OK. What's not OK, is that I can then open a similar factory in China (or wherever), dump the toxic waste into a river (either

Or perhaps it is a lesson to other leaders of state that assumed that the US President had unilateral power to commit the US to treaties

I just want to add that this is not a treaty. Treaties require 2/3rd Senate approval. This was sought under a sole-executive agreement by the US and is why the agreement is ultimately non-binding, additionally, it is also why it is called an agreement, since agreements do not require anything from Congress except that the President give notice that the US has entered one within 20-days.

Side notes for anyone interested. There's also Congressional-Executive agreements (CEAs) which is basically the same as

Agreed. Paris is a top down thing. Letting companies develop green energy sources and consumers adopt them is a bottom up. Top down rarely works unless there is a consensus in society, which for climate change there isn't. That said I'd like that the government stimulates research in green energy sources.

I don't think that market economics are enough to stop global warming. It requires a political component, which the Paris Climate Accord was a small but important part of. It also will require sequestration efforts in addition to CO2-neutral energy production. I can't see us avoiding an unpleasant future unless we enact some kind of CO2 tax to fund renewables and sequestration initiatives, etc. CO2 emissions are a cost that are realized globally but not privately, so market economics alone will not correctly optimize that industry. Pulling out of the Paris Accord really gives the wrong message. It's not that the Paris Accord alone solves much of anything by itself, but it adds political momentum in the right direction.

A lot of history can be told with the narrative that our ancestors went through hell, fought and died, to give future generations a better life. Maybe that's a romanticized view of the past, but regardless it reflects an ideology that's the exact opposite of what we are doing today.

Blue states should get together and promise internationally to try to keep the spirit of the agreement alive in their respective states. While it may not be constitutional to make formal agreements, at least token pledges can be given.

Time to leave the troglodytes in the dust; they will drag us backward if we let them set the agenda. And they are an embarrassment to the USA.

I've heard rumblings about states like California and New York entering a multi-state compact towards meeting the Paris climate goals. IANAL but AFAIK this sort of agreement is perfectly constitutional.

And they will, largely because the next phase after Paris is for the climate bloc to begin disincentivizing emissions-heavy industries, which means US manufacturers may find export markets becoming a lot more expensive. A lot of states rely pretty damned heavily on exports, and they'll have little choice but to join a compact that guarantees low emissions as a qualifier for products they ship abroad.

This is the real irony. The halfwit at the top of the heap who keeps talking about how the US needs a better deal is in fact going to fuck over the very people he claims to help, and right now they'll cheer, because everyone loves a guy who confirms their prejudices, but in five, ten years, it will be a rather different story. By then, of course, oil's value will have dwindled even more, and all the folks who pushed Trump to get out of Paris will have made all the money they can. The reason the US is pumping so much oil out of the ground, no matter how much it increases inventory, and regardless of slipping demand, is because if the oil doesn't get pumped out in the next decade or so, it will never get pumped out at all.

There's some analysis suggesting that the US being out of any agreements like this will allow the other 194 countries that "believe" in science to be more aggressive on emission targets, and that on net might be a positive result. The US could then get its act together if and when we stop electing Republican idiots, which could happen as early as 2020.

"Draining the swamp" means 5 specific promises related to lobbying, and he's enacted them for the executive branch (no lobbying after executive branch service for 5 years, no lobbying for a foreign power ever). The rest require the legislature, and they're working on that.

You can't just make up whatever you want "Draining the swamp" to mean and then say he's not doing it. "Trump didn't appoint only lesbian eskimo transmidgets to the Supreme Court! So much for 'Draining the Swamp,' huh?!?!"

Every country that remains a signatory under the Paris Accord, and upholds its respective commitments, has the right to impose unilateral tariffs on the USA to cover the economic and social impacts resulting from the USA's impacts on the climate.

Every country that remains a signatory under the Paris Accord, and upholds its respective commitments, has the right to impose unilateral tariffs on the USA to cover the economic and social impacts resulting from the USA's impacts on the climate.

Every country can impose tariffs for any reason they like, I really doubt any treaty they've withdrawn from prevents the US from returning the favor. If there are, Trump can always withdraw from those too. And if he really wants to mess with the international community he can declare them null and void on the spot. The US is a sovereign nation, the worst anyone can do is pass a UN resolution but they can't even rattle a two bit dictator in North Korea. If the US really wants out, it's out. And as I understa

I'm not surprised, It's the one big thing he can do quickly to fulfil a campaign promise and stick it to the 'libruls' where he does not have to deal with congress, the constitution or the judicial system. He can just pull out of the Paris Accord and declare a glorious victory, temporary balm for a bruised ego. Meanwhile China stands by on the sidelines with plans for a $900 billion fund to invest in overseas energy and infrastructure projects and watches approvingly as the US shoots it self in the foot by abandoning any leading role it may have in the development of clean energy tech. Same for Germany which is in the middle of doing the exact opposite of what Trump plans to do and will along with China probably be a world leader in renewable energy tech if by the time Trump is done takign a machete to the US clean energy tech sector. So, folks! It's amateur hour at the White House for the 132nd day in a row!

Let's be honest: the next time a Democrat is president they will probably either join the Paris accords, or adopt policies that align with the accords anyway. This is what American has turned into: our politics are so partisan that pretty much the first thing a new party administration does when they take office is to overrule or counteract policies of the previous administration (except of course for policies that erode away our rights in the name of "national security"). America is running around in circles (and wasting trillions of dollars in the process) while the rest of the world passes us by. And the sad thing is a lot of Americans are cheering as it happens.

Let's be honest: the next time a Democrat is president they will probably either join the Paris accords, or adopt policies that align with the accords anyway. This is what American has turned into: our politics are so partisan that pretty much the first thing a new party administration does when they take office is to overrule or counteract policies of the previous administration (except of course for policies that erode away our rights in the name of "national security"). America is running around in circles (and wasting trillions of dollars in the process) while the rest of the world passes us by. And the sad thing is a lot of Americans are cheering as it happens.

I feel roughly the same way. I am of the opinion that we should withdraw from all of these idiotic inconsequential agreements, but should continue to strive to eliminate the environmental damage we're causing. I think NASA climate programs should be defunded... In favor of funding NOAA appropriately. Etc, Etc... As someone that voted for Johnson, Trump is doing exactly half of what I wanted, and it makes me look bad because I 'coincidentally' agree with ~50% of his actions (Gut the EPA, Gut the FDA, Fi

That may be true for what Trump is doing now but it definitely was not true when Obama took office, which is actually one of the big reasons I was disappointed with him as a president. The ACLU had this elaborate document made up between the election and inauguration day cheerfully outlining all of the good things the new President could do to reverse the damage GWB had done within days, weeks, months, etc, of taking office, a nice timeline of how quickly the damage could be undone. Pretty much none of it h

Hopefully, instead, we will implement a tax on ALL CONSUMED GOODS/SERVICES based on what state/nations the worst CO2 comes from.
All that needs to happen is that we need OCO3 to have precise (not necessarily accurate; just precise is what is needed) measurements between states/nations, along with normalizing based on emissions / $ GDP.
With this, America raises the tax on the emissions/$GDP. This will force all nations to drop their emission over time, or lose their export market. In addition, it will benefit those nations that have low emission / $ GDP.

Can't really blame a guy for following through with his campaign promises.

You can blame all the people that voted for him though. When climate change costs your nation money, you ought to sue the US and others for damages. I suspect international courts in 20 years will be really receptive to the idea when willful ignorance [rationalwiki.org] played such a big part in the US's choices around climate change denial.

Can't really blame a guy for following through with his campaign promises.

Why not? He said "piss off" to his constituents on plenty of other topics, such as Nafta or his hard stance on China. This is simply the willful ignorance of a single man. Individual voters can at least say they voted for him for other reasons and climate change wasn't a litmus test for them, but Trump has no excuse.

When 100% of the countries invited to be part of the Paris Climate Agreement felt the agreement was either worth signing or didn't go far enough to curb emissions, its safe to say you can objectively say what the reasonable opinion is. There are no other world leaders ignorant enough to do what Trump did, we have the worst one. Even North Korea ratified it.

The funniest thing of all is that the Paris agreement was 100% voluntary. Each individual nation could set whatever parameters for reduction it wanted including no reduction at all. He could have just changed the numbers and marched on and no one could do anything about it.

The funny this is it takes 3 years to withdraw plus a one year wait after the 3, when he loses in 2020 the new president will be able to halt the process. Hell when the Democrats take back Congress in 2018 they will be able to halt his action. If he's just stayed in and revised the numbers no one could have stopped him and it would have been immediate.

And it's beyond stupid, he took America away from the negotiating table. For a claimed deal maker not sitting at the table is about the stupidest deal you can make! Without the US at the table the rest of the world could decide to impose carbon tariffs on the US exports. You gain absolutely NOTHING by not participating, you can only lose.

What happens when the remaining signatories to the climate accord decide to implement a 5% carbon tax on all products imported from countries that are not substantially meeting their obligations under the deal. One man's climate treaty is another mans trading block. I don;t care if we're in or out provided that we're making substantial efforts to clean up our environment, but if we're out then we don't get to say how the block operates.

I suspect international courts in 20 years will be really receptive to the idea when willful ignorance [rationalwiki.org] played such a big part in the US's choices around climate change denial.

The notion of listening to "international courts" is a slippery slope. Is some 3rd world country going to sue for one hundred trillion dollars and get it - maybe. Politics can drive such absurdities. However I think much of the US will say come and try and take it.

Here's another idea, why not keep our money and spend it on developing natural gas and reducing the cost and danger of nuclear by undoing the regulations that prohibit fuel rod recycling. That would do more for reducing CO2 emissions than throwing our dollars into a U.N. black hole ever will.

You unveil your intense ignorance with each sentence. There are no costs mandated by the Paris Climate Agreement. It was non-binding and had no ramifications if we didn't uphold our end of the bargain. It is hard to not just spout expletives when responding to your comment since it shows such an immense lack of knowledge and the belief your ignorance should be considered in public policy.

No part of the US Climate Action Plan included sending money overseas. It was about investing in industries and technologies so we could reduce our damage to the planet while being leading innovators in the fastest growing energy sector in the world. Stop reading Breitbart and get your head out of your ass.

If any of your proposed solutions could reduce carbon emissions while not damaging the environment even more in other ways, then sure they should be considered. The Paris Climate Agreement didn't stop us from building nuclear plants or developing natural gas.

You unveil your intense ignorance with each sentence. There are no costs mandated by the Paris Climate Agreement.

Actually, the Paris agreement required developed countries to provide *at least* $100B per year by the year 2020...

Agreement shall set a new collective quantified goal from a floor of USD 100 billion per year, taking into account the needs and priorities of developing countries; Recognizes the importance of adequate and predictable financial resources, including for results-based payments, as appropriate, for the implementation of policyapproaches and positive incentives for reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation, and the role of conservation, sustainable management of forests and enhancement of forest carbon stocks; as well as alternative policy approaches, such as joint mitigation and adaptation approaches for the integral and sustainable management offorests; while reaffirming the importance of non-carbon benefits associated with such approaches; encouraging the coordination of support from, inter alia, public and private, bilateral and multilateral sources, such as the Green Climate Fund, and alternative sources in accordance with relevant decisions by the Conference of the Parties;

Well, yes. But it's non-binding! So clearly the Grand-poster is in favor of just lying to the rest of the world. Keep agreeing to this arrangement until the invoice comes, and then just say no?

Or as part of the ongoing negotiations about how we reach the $100 billion mark, we put forth arguments about other things we are doing which would allow us to not put money towards the $100 billion. Perhaps we invest more than any other country in clean energy technology instead. There are plenty of ways we as a country can show we are serious about climate change without giving money to other countries if that was really the problem.

But in reality this figure is just a scapegoat used by children who want

Your point is that we should have honored the agreement by ignoring the agreement?

No, but no where in the agreement does it show which countries pay the $100 billion. If the US really didn't want to fulfill its obligations it could make other guesters, such as spending $100 billion ourselves in clean energy per year. Still kind of shitty that we wouldn't directly help developing nations not pollute as much as we did when we were growing, but at least we could say we are doing something.

Also remember that aid is not some blackhole than money disappears into.

China will say to any number of nations: "Here, have some climate impact mitigation aid money, but you must buy Chinese equipment/services with it.".The money soon flows back to Chinese companies (after being skimmed for kickbacks and some local handling). These Chinese companies use the money to ramp up production, gaining economies of scale through what in effect is government based support that neatly does an end run around WTO state aid rules. Now, not only has the USA been locked out of these initial deals, it's locked out of the long term contracts (services, maintenance, upgrades), has lost vital mindshare in these new markets and has potentially allowed Chinese companies to undercut US prices because they've had a big whack of state aid.

Sure, you've made some coal miners temporarily happy and sold a few more #MAGA hats, but you've potentially buggered up some juicy long term markets in which America could have competed.

And that's the best case scenario, because if the agreement parties decide that more urgent action is needed, a carbon tariff on non-signatories could really cause headaches for American companies.

Given the Trump administration seems to be getting a kick out of giving the rest of the world the middle finger, I can imagine the rest of the world won't have too many qualms about sticking it to the USA in return.

And what is "it really is". Virtually every climatologist states CO2 emissions are increasing surface and ocean temperatures. We're already seeing the direct verifiable signs of that warming, and it will only get worse. Even without US in the Paris agreement, demand for oil is steadily shrinking, so all that really happens now is the US gives up any say on future targets, and will have to rejoin the international community on future agreements with little power save to accede to whatever the EU and China have decided. And for what? For a resource that's value is dwindling, and will never recover? For a decade or two more before oil's value is so low that it's not worth pumping out of the ground? So the Koch Brothers and a few Trump cronies can make a few more bucks, and meanwhile the very people that voted for this halfwit are the ones that get screwed the most?

Oil is dying. Natural gas will follow. Fossil fuels are the past, and good riddance, and the US will regret this for decades to come. But this is how empires die, I suppose, once morons can get to the top of the heap, what's left?

Let's imagine in ten years, when new trade agreements, particularly with large trading blocs, start demanding CO2 reductions as part of any favorable access? Let's try to imagine how much this will cost US manufacturers over the coming decades? Do you think the EU-China climate bloc is just going to let the US off the hook for paying for their towards a carbon-less future? The US will pay, and it will pay dearly, and I hope when the time comes, everyone remembers that it was the sociopaths and morons of the Republican Party, and that payback may come sooner than people think when SCOTUS starts disemboweling gerrymandering and some of these so-called "red states" start turning blue.

Not only is everyone else going to remain in your supposedly "bad deal" but China in particular is soon going to use it to turn the screws on the US. You fail to see the big picture here, that the "deal" isn't just about future emissions targets, it's about who gets to call the shots going forward, and the EU-China climate pact represents the largest trading and population group on the planet.

This idea that some people, like you, apparently have that Paris will fall part because the US backs out is not only just wrong, but utterly delusional. China, and likely now that Trump has gone out of his way to show his contempt for Europe, the EU as well, are going to use Paris and successor agreements to pummel the US.

And then you still have to factor in the ever-mounting costs to the US having to actual deal with the physical effects of AGW. Oil isn't dying fast enough to keep emissions, and consequently temperature increases, from royally fucking things over, so if China, the EU and everyone else that signs aboard has to pay a large proportion of the bill, then they are going to use the overwhelming economic clout of this new pact to make the US pay in every other conceivable way.

Nuclear is almost the expensive way to produce power there is. What is this obsession with nuclear? It only makes sense when you're prepared for massive amounts of taxpayer subsidy.

Nuclear is expensive in a large part due to the cost of fuel and waste handling. Both costs can be reduced dramatically by implementing fuel rod recycling like is done in most other countries. Currently we take the "spent" rods (which are still 95% fissible material) and dissolve them in giant acid vats, vitrified, and must be treated as highly radioactive waste for 1000's of years. Instead, we could be recycling them and producing only low-grade non-radioactive waste. We don't because of nonproliferation treaties, not a lack of capability. France uses nuclear as it's primary power source and already recycles its fuel.

This change, combined with safer and more efficient modern reactor designs could make nuclear far cheaper than it is today. Good luck reaching high penetration of wind/solar without a baseload power source. Nuclear seems like a good option given it doesn't directly emit CO2.

Taxpayer subsidies are bad? Every significant form of renewable energy has been and/or is being supported by all manner of subsidy. Somehow it's only a problem for nuclear/fossil fuels...

And you're badly wrong about the cost of nuclear power. France, for instance, pays less for electricity than every other major European economy because of it's large and well operated nuclear energy system [1]. France also emits far less carbon than its neighbors; have a look at the live map: https://www.electricitymap.org... [electricitymap.org]

Oh fuck off. Nuclear is almost the expensive way to produce power there is. What is this obsession with nuclear? It only makes sense when you're prepared for massive amounts of taxpayer subsidy.

THings have gone badly wrong with the managing of the nuclear industry. It's the safest form of power measured in deaths per TWh, but we're stuck with ageing 1970s tech, and building brand new 1970s tech. The mismanagement caused by misplaced fear means we're running the equivalent of nuclear Pintos in 2017.

Safety and density have a lot going for it. It doesn't matter as much for a country like the USA, but for smaller, denser countries, it's the only way to gain energy independence to any degree. Once you get to a country like the UK, renewables aren't going to cut it.

Nuclear power isn't the most dangerous one - fossil fuels are. Burning fossil fuels releases more radioactive elements into the atmosphere (and locally into the ground) than nuclear power and also releases a lot of other nasty things _proven_ to be hazardous to health. A modern nuclear reactor is pretty damn safe and the Fukushima mess* actually proves that - the complex suffered a tripple(!) meltdown with relatively little radioactive leakage most of which were due to hydrogen-oxygen explosions that destro

Put up sanctions against us. Seriously. It would be entirely justified and then some. The world puts sanctions on countries for merely looking at certain countries the wrong way, and we're basically attacking all of you, and all your children, and all your children's children.

The areas of the country that realize climate change will be hurt by such sanctions, sure, but we didn't do enough to prevent this. Plus, it'll punish the red states that gleefully thumb their noses at the rest of you more. Deserved.

If you put sanctions on us and refuse to buy shit from us or trade with us, that drives down the amount of carbon we put in the air. It'll hurt us now, but that's better than letting us ruin shit.

Sanctions didn't really stop the spread of communism, despite many decades of trying, but I'm willing to bet that it could be effective in trying to prevent the spread of climate change.

Please, fuck us up economically. It's the only way we'll change and we deserve it now.

This treaty was never a treaty. It was an agreement between Obama and the other countries. If he wanted anything he did to last he should have gone through the Senate as the constitution dictates. I realize there would have been pushback to say the least by the GOP but you don't get to ignore the constitution just because it is inconvenient.

What is this nonsense? Who called it a treaty? Where are you getting this from?

Do you even know what a treaty is? Do you know what an agreement is? Do you know what the constitution actually requires? It doesn't say: "The President is congress' little bitch and has to get approval before he says anything to anyone." Under the present circumstances that may be an unfortunate truth, but it is a truth.

If we are willing to work for it, and fight for it, and believe in it, then I am absolutely certain that generations from now, we will be able to look back and tell our children that this was the moment when we began to provide care for the sick and good jobs to the jobless; this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal; this was the moment when we ended a war and secured our nation and restored our image as the last, best hope on earth.

The ironic thing is that mid-term (not even long-term) this hurts us financially. The more climate changes the more we need to spend preventing coastal erosion. The more we need to spend upgrading our sewage and storm drainage. The more we need to spend recovering from weather related disasters and extreme weather events.

Where is all this money going to come from? Probably future taxes, on both citizens and businesses.

Also, more farmers will hurt as their traditional crops no longer grow in their area a

It's hardly good will. China sees the US retreating into populist stupidity, and sees its chance to reach for the brass ring of major power status. Russia, no matter how much Putin puffs his chest, is a power in a long decline, and now the US, under possibly the stupidest man to ever inhabit the White House, abandons leadership. China and the EU both now have a path to basically running the world.

all empires eventually recede, Greek, Roman, Ottoman, UK - all got to a point where they thought they were safe and solid then an upstart came along and took the reigns. The US is just another economic power experiencing a start to its downturn in influence with certain individuals thinking it doesn't need anyone else.

And what do you imagine Canada and Mexico are thinking right now? Canada already has a free trade agreement with the EU, and is seriously looking at a trade agreement with China. Mexico certainly can't be far behind. In the short term both countries will likely suffer from any trade reductions with the US, but both have known for some time that they need to look further afield for trade agreements. And all future trade agreements are going to have much more rigorous climate and environment components. By the time the US regains its senses, it will be a follower, and will have little choice but to abide by what the EU and China decide, and what they will be deciding is that if you want any favorable market access, you're going to have to demonstrate emissions reductions.

In the short term, I'm thinking a number of major states, in particular California (the sixth largest economy in the world) will have to try to make up for Washington's stupidity. If the US is lucky, the "unofficial" climate agreements California manages to push through may be enough to make up for what will be at least four years of simpering morons running the country, but there's only so much US states can do, and they cannot enter any major international agreements. In the end, states like California will basically have to abide by whatever Paris or future agreements require, with no formal ability to negotiate future agreements. In essence, California will cease to be a strong economy that can use the muscle of the United States of America to gain some sort of preferential treatment, and will simply have to abide by whatever the climate bloc decides.

The EU-China bloc represents 2 billion people and a GDP of over 31 trillion dollars, as compared to the US's roughly 321 million people and 18 trillion per annum. Simply put, the US, rather than being a significant player in future economic agreements (because, as I said, climate change will be part of all future agreements), will end up having no international voice. It's phenomenal to imagine that anyone in Washington, even if they somehow believe God makes CO2's physical properties different because Jesus loves oil and coal, believes this is a good idea. It's absolutely phenomenal that the fossil fuel industry, with the value of its products steadily declining, could have such a strong hold over the US government. It really does appear that the US is run by a mentally retarded person, enabled not necessarily sociopaths, but by pure idiots. If they impeach that halfwit, they will have to replace him with a man just as equally shortsighted. The Republican Party surely must know at this point just what ruin they are wreaking on the country they claim to love. They are either utterly impotent, or utter fools.

What leaving DOES do is give up the opportunity for the U.S. to have a leadership role, or any role, in international discussions on climate change. The rest of the world will move on, without us. That means uncountable opportunities missed, picked up by, I don't know, China?

This is the same reason scrapping the Trans-Pacific Trade Agreement was stupid. You don't like it, you change it. You don't just walk away, because if you do, some other power will gladly take over. Like China.

And you wonder why there's an anti-environmental, anti-science backlash? How about we stop with the hyperbole and present the facts as is, without embellishment or absurd scare tactics? How many ridiculous now-provably-false doomsday scenarios were proclaimed over the past 40 years? Did you not think this would undermine public opinion at some point? Well, congratulations. People no longer trust scientists!

A few articles down, some undoubtedly well-meaning activist wrote about how we're "scorching the planet". I swear, many environmentalists are their own worst enemy. They could turn the public against a "be kind to kittens and puppies" campaign. Maybe if we acted like adults and engaged people with reason, rather than lashing out at them for being a basket of deniers, we could make some progress. Trump is simply a reaction to nonsense like this.

Want to know how to appeal to Republicans and conservatives? Focus on the economics of a home-grown energy industry with long-term sustainability. Highlight the usefulness of energy independence, and the national security implications of reducing oil imports from countries who really don't have the US interests at heart. Argue that conserving our own valuable oil reserves for strategic emergencies or critical infrastructure makes more long term sense than burning it unnecessarily, and how more electric vehicles will help to further reduce smog and particulate emissions in major cities. Point out how this will be a long-term investment in our national infrastructure and create economic opportunities for technological exports. Remind them of the successful reduction in smog levels despite more cars on the road than ever, thanks to improved technology and tougher regulations.

What not to do: focus on punitive carbon taxes as a magic solution, belittle your opponents, and make insane doomsday predictions with beyond-worst-case-scenario projected data that will inevitably not come to pass. Some of you are advocating outright economic warfare against the US. Yeah, that'll go over well with average folks.

There are lots of upsides to transitioning to carbon-neutral power technologies even without considering climate change, but realistically, it's going to take time to move our entire grid over to those. Rushing into things without lots of prototypes and refinement is just asking for economic disaster. At the same time, pushing too hard on the public creates a lot of unnecessary resistance to otherwise sound and reasonable policies. You can see that we're now moving backwards thanks to a populist backlash.

We're going to need broad support and consensus of not just scientists, but *everybody*, if we're going to make some real progress in this area.

And you wonder why there's an anti-environmental, anti-science backlash? How about we stop with the hyperbole and present the facts as is, without embellishment or absurd scare tactics? How many ridiculous now-provably-false doomsday scenarios were proclaimed over the past 40 years? Did you not think this would undermine public opinion at some point? Well, congratulations. People no longer trust scientists!

And somehow you got modded up to +5, even thought you did nothing to counter the argument other than emotional claims about "hyperbole". Did you even bother to do some back-of-the-envelope calculations? The facts seem to be actually as scary. Coal is this bad.

150000 [wikipedia.org] people die daily. There's 6683 [endcoal.org] operating coal plants above 30MW worldwide. It is strongly debatable how many deaths can be attributed to pollution -- in China big cities there are claims it's 1/3 total deaths! China makes a good part of world's population and is about 50% urbanized, same as world's average. I don't know the methodology of the source I took the data from (or even remember the place), but their figure of 1/20 sounds like an underestimation to me. But let's take it at face value. Coal power plants have a massive share of pollution compared to other sources, not sure what's the share: for electricity generation it's 44% but I'd guess it's more for heating, steel production, etc. Let's round it to 1/2. That results in 1/40 deaths being attributable to coal, which is more than 1/44 required for the figure of one per two days per power plant.